youth conference

They planned a missionary-themed youth conference. Doug and I taught workshops on Friday and Saturday.

new couch

Many houses in Florida have an area known as the Florida room. Our house is too old for such a modern innovation. I guess in Victorian times it would have been called a conservatory, except that it doesn’t have a glass roof nor glass walls. Doug calls it my office.  Suffice it to say that I have my sunny space that overlooks the garden, and it makes me happy.

the miami open

This tennis event in Miami used to be called Sony Ericson. Doug and I loved attending before the mission. We came down with Rick and Linda and Natalie Teets.

It was awesome. Natalie got autographed tennis balls for Doug from quite a few of the tennis greats, including Serena Williams and Novak Djokovic. I did an object lesson for the missionaries last year using a clip from Djokovic and I have to say,  I really enjoyed watching him play, among others, of course!

walkie talkies

The boys had fun running all over the property trying out the walkie talkies. We even took them to WalMart with us and talked to them in the fort and in the attic! It’s good to keep in touch.

wonderworks

Melanie finally talked us all into an excursion away from the Birdhouse. And thanks to some help from a friend, we ended up at Wonderworks.

I have to say that it was a lot of fun.

gone fishin’

Tru and Elliot caught 14 fish the first two days at the Birdhouse. Truman even rigged up a fishing pole from a dead twig that was successful. Cleaning the fish was an unpleasant chore, however, and they decided that catch and release was definitely the way to go from then on.